Growth Of Counselling Research Articles

Utilizing Relational Cultural Theory in Addressing Sexism in the Counseling Relationship

ABSTRACTThe Multicultural and Social Justice Counseling Competencies conceptual framework includes a quadrant to represent a privileged client working with a marginalized counselor. Given this and given the dearth of literature on how counselors might handle microaggressions from their clients, the authors advocate for utilizing Relational Cultural Theory (RCT) to respond to microaggressions in a therapeutic way that promotes relational growth in counseling. In order to illustrate this, the authors provide a hypothetical case example, specifically sexism from a male client to a female counselor.

Can reflecting on personal values online increase positive beliefs about counseling?

This research developed and tested an online values-affirmation exercise to attenuate threat and enhance positive beliefs about counseling among individuals struggling with mental health concerns. There is evidence that reflecting on personal values (values-affirmation) is an effective approach to eliciting self-affirmation-a psychological process that temporarily bolsters self-worth in order to forestall maladaptive, self-protective responses to counseling information. The present study utilized a randomized 2-group between-subjects design to test the effectiveness of a values-affirmation exercise with an online sample (N = 186) of adults who reported struggling with a mental health concern. It was predicted that values-affirmation would reduce threat related to reading mental health information and increase positive beliefs about counseling. Results indicated that those in the values-affirmation condition reported fewer negative emotions such as feeling upset, irritable, hostile, and scared after reading mental health information, indicating that the information was perceived as less threatening. There was also evidence that engaging in values-affirmation was associated with greater anticipated growth in counseling and greater intent to seek counseling, reflecting greater positive beliefs about counseling. Overall, the results suggest that reflecting on personal values may have the potential to enhance the positive effects of online psychoeducation. (PsycINFO Database Record

Development and current status of counselling psychology in Taiwan

This article details the three stages of counselling psychology’s development in Taiwan, including pre-legislation, legislation and post-legislation. In pre-legislation stage, a brief historical review of the growth of counselling and guidance is introduced, which is the root of the contemporary counselling psychology. The process of the Psychology Act’s legislation is described in legislation stage and the relationships between counselling teachers and clinical psychologist are also discussed. In the post-legislation stage, the licensure system, training programmes, main professional organizations, work settings, and the major opportunities and challenges for the counselling psychology field are presented. In addition, the article refers to data from a national survey of 124 counselling psychologists to provide a profile of the counselling psychologists in Taiwan.

Using Creativity to Make Practicum a Transformative Experience

Students enter their practicum experience with the assumption that they will learn the skills needed to help clients. However, growth in counseling can be bidirectional; both the client and the student-counselor can benefit. The purpose of this article is to describe a creative arts assignment that helps students express how a client changed them, not just as counselors but as a person. We start with a review of the literature to elucidate the benefits of using creative arts in counselor education. The instructions for and logic behind the assignment are provided. Feedback and trends from three interviews with students who completed this creative arts project are described. We conclude by connecting the literature with the benefits our students experienced.

International Counseling Introduction

The growth of counseling around the world is one of the major and most exciting emerging trends in the counseling profession. Although it was once thought to be primarily a U.S. phenomenon, other countries located on virtually every continent are developing counseling services to meet their unique mental health needs. The globalization of communication technology, transportation systems, and business has stimulated the initiation and growth of governmentally and privately sponsored mental health programs. Many nations throughout the world recognize that positive mental health is a valuable social/economic asset regardless of a country's political orientation.

Theorizing therapeutic culture

Analyses of the influence of psychology and the growth of counselling during the 20th century commonly point to the deleterious effects of a cultural shift from reticence and self-reliance to emotional expressiveness and help-seeking. Indeed, the ascendancy of therapeutic culture has been widely interpreted as fostering cultural decline and enabling new forms of social control. Drawing on less pessimistic assessments of cultural change and recent directions in social theory, this article argues for greater recognition of the ambivalent legacy of the therapeutic turn. Through a reinterpretation of the consequences of the diminution of traditional authority, the weakening of the division between public and private life, and the rise of the confessional, the article challenges dominant readings of decline and control. In doing so, it draws attention to how psychological knowledge and therapeutic understandings of the self have given legitimacy to, and furnished a language with which to articulate, experiences of suffering formerly confined to private life. In advancing a less pessimistic interpretation of cultural change, it considers two historic moments in Australia: the advent of telephone counselling in the 1960s and the Royal Commission on Human Relationships in the 1970s.

The Audiology Counseling Growth Checklist for Student Supervision

Most of the new professional doctorate programs in audiology (Au.D.) have acknowledged the importance of the development of students' counseling skills through the establishment of separate courses in audiologic counseling or the incorporation of counseling education within their existing course offerings. A recent survey has suggested that many clinical supervisors/preceptors affiliated with Au.D. programs may not be fully prepared to nurture student development in this area. Yet training in the development of a trusting relationship between health-care providers and their patients is paramount to clinical success. This article discusses the use of the Audiology Counselor Growth Checklist as a means to facilitate the development of positive clinical relationships. Through examination of five distinct areas of clinical interaction, supervisors can help students increase their confidence within the clinician-patient dynamic, feel more comfortable when delivering the bad news of hearing loss, and respond to angry or confrontational patients in a manner that may help move sessions in a more positive direction.

Trouble in the village? Counselling and clinical psychology in the NHS

Over the past two decades, counselling has sought to position itself within a number of different professional contexts. In recent years the growth of counselling in medical settings, most notably in primary care, has been considerable, and in many areas in the UK the presence of a counsellor in a GP surgery is now the norm rather than the exception. In many cases, counsellors are employed by psychological services and are supervised by psychologists. This is often an uneasy relationship and raises a number of issues that are highlighted in this paper. Copyright © 2004 Whurr Publishers Ltd.

Securing a base on the frontline: of a Primary Care Counselling Service

The author begins this paper by noting the continued growth of counselling in Primary Health Care and that increasingly counselling is being delivered in Managed Care services. He describes his own role as a manager and supervisor of one such service operating on the front line of an inner city. He outlines the contribution that a regular meeting time for the counsellors has made to their ongoing support. The fortnightly Organizational meeting has provided a reflective space for the counsellors in which it has been possible for them to share the pain and the difficulties of their work in their respective surgeries. This in turn has contributed to their ability to maintain depressive-position functioning in the face of the complex emotional demands of their work. The author goes on to describe how he applied open systems theory in identifying and defining the nature of his own role and tasks as manager of the service. By placing himself at the boundary of the service, and attending to the various boundaries that the service had with the external environment, he shows how he was thereby more able to facilitate the counsellors in their own work and practice in the surgeries. This in turn contributed to the ability of the service to remain focussed upon its Primary Task, and to lessen the likelihood of it developing a self-assigned impossible task. The author explores the compatibility of his role as supervisor with his role as manager in a counselling service where the managerial role is facilitatively placed on the boundary. The paper concludes with a description of a crisis in the counselling service that required a re-focussing of attention on new boundaries with the external environment.

The Experience of Leader-Led Peer Supervision: Genetic Counselors' Perspectives.

As we proceed through our professional lives, it is essential that we challengeourselves in order to continue to develop our genetic counseling skills. Conferences, workshops,post-graduate courses, journal clubs, and involvement in professional organizations havebecome the traditional methods of continuing education for post-graduate geneticcounselors. While these forums address the need to stay updated on scientific orinformation-based topics, there is little available to counselors to promote growth incounseling skills. A group of Boston-based genetic counselors describe how their leader-ledsupervision group has established a setting to meet the needs of its members both forsupport and continued counseling training. We outline here the evolution of this group andhow it has become a valued part of our professional lives. We feel that the model of leader-ledpeer supervision holds great value in helping genetic counselors continue to enhancetheir interpersonal skills in a supportive, safe, and challenging environment. It is our hopethat others will elect to form similar groups in their own communities, thereby creating newopportunities for growth within the genetic counseling profession.

Counselling in primary care: Past, present and future

The rapid growth of counselling in primary care has happened unofficially and almost by stealth over recent years until it has established a niche within many primary health care teams. If it is to survive following the latest reform of the NHS, it has some serious challenges to face. These challenges are to the very nature of counselling and involve the need to establish the professional identity of the counsellor in primary care. The current bias towards the regulation of health professionals also impinges upon counsellors in this domain, along with the need for their effective management and harmonisation of services within the health service. Evidence for the effectiveness of counselling is a pressing concern in a realm where the random control trial has reigned supreme. Whether or not counselling in primary care is subsumed into other health care professionals' roles is a matter for much speculation. Perhaps counselling will become 'medicalised' or perhaps it will develop further and continue to offer a different perspective on health and healing and remain in place to further enrich the services offered in primary care.

The preparation of counsellors in Europe: Possible solutions for an impossible task?

The growth of counselling and psychotherapy presents trainers in Europe with significant opportunities. But these need to take account of human development over the millenia, harnessing ancient psychology to the resolution of contemporary problems. In particular, there is a need for contextual counselling, beating practice in culture. Extrapolating from UK data, a minimum practitioner requirement for Europe could be 50,000–75,000 counsellors. With only minimal training programmes in many European countries, meeting the seven core criteria of training seems impossible. One possible solution is to cluster people with limited training around a high-standard professional counsellor—a system used in the UK for situation-specific counselling. A number of European states are now seeking to develop a counselling capability. Training for this should break new ground by learning from older systems but also being unafraid to adopt novel solutions.

A gestalt point of view on facilitating growth in counseling

Personal growth has frequently been mentioned as one positive attribute clients might realize through counseling. On the other hand, textbooks on counseling theory have little to say on the topic of growth. If counselors are to be facilitators of client growth, it would seem essential that they become familiar with the concept of growth and ways to facilitate it. The author defines growth from a gestalt therapy point of view and provides techniques and examples of ways to facilitate client growth.